Leaking Mojo and Demonic Possession

Sets 78-79 (of 365):

Stuart vs. S. Winner at South Austin: Stuart 6-1, 7-5.

My Mojo: Steady but Slowly Leaking And Turned to Goo at the End

The first set, my serve was totally on. My ground strokes were positioned well, but I was not getting as much topspin as I would have liked, and I was not getting power. But my serves were doing almost exactly what I wanted them to. I got most of my first serves in, and even hit some winners on second serves. His serves were powerful but did not seem terribly accurate, and I was thinking to myself that I bet his serves would be a lot better for him if he backed off on the power just about fifteen percent and concentrated more on placement. It seemed like he was relying on raw power for his serves. When they worked, they were awesome, though I had enough mojo at first to return most of the faster ones that went in. I felt like I won the first set on strategy, though it did seem like he was making a lot of errors.

The second set was marked by a combination of me losing focus a little bit and him tightening up his game and improving his accuracy. For a while I just felt like my mojo was leaking. His errors went down and his shots became more accurate. He also got more of his irst serves in, and I just didn't have as much there to get the harder ones back. i was hitting some of his fast serves a little late so they were going wide. So I made an attempt to stand a little farther back and hit the ball farther forward. This adjustment helped a little. I drifted in and out of being tense as well. I won the first three games, and then he won two, I won one, and he won the next two to even it up at 4-4. Then he won the next game and it was 5-4. At that point, we took a little bit longer break than usual (we had hardly been stopping at all on the changeovers) and I walked to the end of deuce court and noticed that my arm was really tense. Then I realized that my whole body was really tense. I made an attempt to loosen up my body from my arm out, and I "concentrated on relaxing", though that sounds like an oxymoron. But it weemed to work. I started hitting with a more relaxed swing, and each stroke had a purpose that was not bothered by tightness and lack of focus. I won the next two games to bring it to 6-5.

On that changeover, we took another long break and had some conversation. Something weird happened when I got back. I was a total spazz in the last game. I was not hitting anything right. It was like a changeling took over my body. I couldn't focus, I couldn't relax, I couldn't hit. Very few of my first serves went in and my second serves just were efforts to get the ball over the net. We got to 30-all, and amazingly, I won the next two points even though I was not there. I have no idea how that happened. Like I said, I wasn't there, even though I was there. Suddenly I returned to realize that I won the match.

He Mixed It Up, I Stayed Steady, I Hurt But Not As Much As Earlier

Sets 74-77 (of 365):

Stuart vs. B. at Northwest Park. Winner: Stuart 6-1, 6-1, 6-1, 6-1.

My Mojo: Still Hurting, but Consistent and Centered

After the last match this morning, I went home, took a hot bath, soaked in it for a long time to soothe my aching body, and took a nap. By tonight, I was still somewhat sore, but definitely not as bad as this morning. Still, I thought I would not play more than two sets. Little did I know that I'd be able to summon up enough mojo to stay in for four sets.

B. started out really trying to overpower, but by doing that, he was not hitting with a lot of accuracy. Still, I was impressed with the power of his serves, and when they went in, they were doozies. I did manage to anticipate enough to hit most of them, even when they were pretty fast, but he definitely got some by me.

I was ahead in most of the games we played tonight, and a few times, I came back from behind to win. But something happened every set that I thought was very strange. B. got really focused for one game every set, and just outmanouvered me big time to win a gme once every set. In the first three sets, he won one game in each set that was on his serve. But in the fourth set, he broke my serve. It seemed like for each of these games that he won, I was suddenly playing a different player. But then his focus would dissipate, and he would go back to playing the same game he was playing before. His serves were usually hard and flat, but as the match went on, he mixed in more high serves and some with a little bit of spin.

This isn't to say that he didn't mix it up. After losing the first set, he stopped trying for power shots, and went for placement more. I just kept playing for consistency and looked for the perfect opportunity to place a ball where he could not get to it. It seemed like I was able to do that more than he was, though he got a few good placements too.

After the second set, I was starting to ache again, but again, not as bad as this morning. He asked me if I wanted to play a third set, and I said, sure, what the heck. Once again, I was pretty consistent, and got some good placements. I was a little surprised that we had the same score because I was starting to feel more sore and a little weaker. He tried mixing in a few more drop shots, which worked well at first, but I started reading them after a while, and started getting to more and more of them.

Then he asked me if I wanted to play a fourth set. In my head, I was thinking, ugghhh, I really am starting to hurt again. Yesterday took a lot out of me. That's what I get for salsa dancing all night long. But I figured, what the heck. I need the endurance training. So I answered pretty much right away, "OK." We played a fourth set, and he turned into Superplayer for one game this set, just like he had in all the other sets, and then lost focus. I was still running stuff down, though. Even though I was hurting, I was still going to run stuff down as long as my heart was beating. And this set, he tried moving me around the court a lot more. Though it pained me, I got to more than I didn't get to. And I solidly won another set. I really expected that he would get more games this set, and that this one would maybe even just be a gimme on my part. I wasn't feeling so much up to it, but I was able to play pretty well, and that surprised me a little.

After the match, he told me that my shots tend to drop right away and not bounce, and it was hard for him to react to that. It is hard for me to get feedback on how my shots land at the other end, and how they are perceived by the other player, because I'm not there. So that was a rare insight into how my shots fall on the other side of the court.

Woo-hoo, I got to play four sets tonight (even though I never dreamed I would have the energy to do that), so I'm already at my new goal of 75 sets by the end of this month. Maybe I'll take a couple days off. I've been starting to feel a little under the weather, and my ear infection seems to be creeping back too. When I was in the bath this afternoon, I soaked it in hydrogen peroxide and alcohol; hopefully that will help. So my next match for the month will probably be the partial third set with T. that I will be finishing on Wednesday, weather (and my physical condition) permitting. Then I can come into February roarin'.

Agony!

Sets 72-73 (of 365):

Stuart vs. C. at Northwest Park. Winner: Stuart 6-1, 6-2.

My Mojo: Physically Depleted, but Calm and Accurate

Well, I got to 70 sets before the end of January. I had been thinking that was going to be my goal for the month. With all the rain that has been happening, I had to scale down what I wanted to get accomplished for the month. I wanted to put some in the bank so when things happened later down the line that caused delay (and I'm sure they will), I would have some credit built up. I'm thinking maybe now I should aim for 74 or 75 by the end of the month, if the weather cooperates.

This morning, it was just hard to roll out of bed. After nearly playing for six hours yesterday, and then going to a party last evening and dancing for much of the time I was there, I was just dead this morning. I did manage to drag myself over to the site, and my opponent called and said he would probably be an hour late because his earlier match had gone long. I had no problem with that as it gave me even more time to recuperate, and also to go to a sporting goods store and get some stuff (see, they could be paying me money to plug them here).

But by the time I started the match, I still was not quite up to par. My legs hurt all the way up and down. I felt like they were made of stone, and every movement I made was laborious. I managed to play pretty well, though, by sort of "relaxing into the pain." This gave me a really good mental attitude and helped me almost completely eliminate my errors so it was up to my opponent to outplay me. And I was also relaxed enough to have some really killer placement of shots, so he couldn't quite get to the place he needed to so he could outplay me. He did get in some really good zingers every once in a while.

For the first three games, I won every point. Then he won the next game, and I only got one point in that game. This was the only game he won in the set. I was still calm, even though in pain, and managed to win the rest of the games. He seemed to get really upset with his play, made someself-deprecating comments, and threw his racquet a couple of times. His attitude helped me in the second set, because, God knows, my physical condition was not going to win the match for me.

In the second set, I won the first four games, and his attitude seemed to diminish his focus. After that, he won the two games he served. He got ahead by a couple points in each of those games, and I thought that I would not fight very hard, and I would save my energy for the games that I served, where I'd have a better chance at maintaining an offense. So I did lose both of those games that he served. I had a couple of tougher rallies with him than I expected in both, considering that I was essentially giving up in both games, though he did usually take the offense with his serve and take the points easily. But I won the two games that I served easily, and won the match.

He seemed to calm down immediately after the match ended, and we had a short and pleasant chat afterward. I told him that normally I would see if he wanted to play more, but today I was just dead. I guess I didn't really realize how much what I did yesterday would take out of me. Well, I have another match at 7:00 tonight, and I'll play it no matter what, probably. But I do have some time to relax, recuperate, invigorate, get some nutrition, and do whatever I need to do to be able to stand up and hit the ball tonight.

Defusing a Secret Weapon

Sets 70-71 (of 365):

Stuart vs. J. at Woodlands Park. Winner: Stuart 6-4, 6-1.
Ladder Match #6

My Mojo: Steady

This was another ladder match. The first set was a pretty intense contest. We went neck-and neck for a while until I broke his serve one game, and then I ended up winning the set. In the second set, I found my footing more, eliminated many of my errors, and figured out successful strategies for dealing with his hyper-spin shots. He had this shot that relied on a huge amount of slice, so that when the ball would drop, it would either not bounce hardly at all, would bounce toward the net, or would bounce off in some goofy direction. In the first set, these shots were getting to me a lot and I was not dealing with them well so he was winning a lot of points with them. By the time the second set arrived, I was able to tell from his mannerisms when he was going to hit that shot and also tell pretty accurately how deep they were going to go, because some bounced right over the net and some went pretty deep. So I just set up right near where the ball landed and prepared to have to reach in just about any direction. I also made sure to stop motion before I set up and hit, because I discovered early that the intense spin of these shots made my shots go long if I was moving through the shot. This shot seemed to be his "secret weapon," and once I figured out how to defuse that, I won pretty easily.

Another Group Lesson

Lesson with R. at Pharr (2 of 10):

My Mojo: Average

I had another group lesson today. Nothing really stands out about it. I hit OK but not spectacular. I had barely enough time between the end of the match with J. and the lesson to get home, wolf down some food, and come back. Maybe I had about fifteen minutes of break time, but otherwise, I played pretty much non-stop from 8:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.

I did stay after to hit with C. and I hit probably a little less accurately than usual. Or she was hitting better than usual, or some combination. Toward the end, I wanted to see if I could win 10 points in a row against her. At first, I got two in and then lost one. But then I started over and I got to twelve. We had to vacate the courts for a match shortly thereafter.

Now I'm resting up at home. I have a ladder match at 5.

On Expressions of Frustration

I've been thinking for some time about the various verbal and non-verbal expressions that a player makes on the court. I've tried to categorize them for your viewing enjoyment.

1) The Power Grunt. This is a player's mantra on the court for getting that extra oomph of power when making a shot. Sometimes these can be highly personalized and individual to one player. For instance, there was one kid that everyone called the "Hi-Yah Kid" because everytime he hit a shot, he screamed at the top of his lungs, "Hi-YAAH!" Sometimes the Power Grunt is uttered every shot, and sometimes it is just saved for that special occasion when you just need a little more octane in your step. I know I fall into the latter category, I do my little yell when I just need an extra burst, but don't do it every shot. This is possibly not really an expression of frustration, but I included it anyway, because it's probably the most common verbalization that players make. And also there's an argument that there is some frustration at not being able to move that extra inch unless the noise is made.

2) The Invocation to a Deity. In my limited experience, this has always been to the Judeo-Christian God. I have never heard anyone invoke the Buddha, or Allah, or any pagan tree god, or any other of the various and sundry deities one can ring up at the register. This consists of either asking for God's help, or requesting that God smite something or somebody. The purest form of the cry for help would be something like, "Why, God, why have you abandoned me in my moment of greatest need and can't you come to my rescue?" Or, as an example of the second option, "May the Lord strike down my opponent with fire and brimstone!" I have to admit that I've never heard either of the examples that I gave here and that they are quite extreme. But maybe that is why they are examples. Usually, the expression comes in it's purest form, just "GAWDDD!!!!" But there are lots of variations, including the mixing of the Invocation to a Deity with Option 3:

3) The Cuss Word. This you hear a lot. Some try to do the a) Sanitized Cuss Word, like "Darn!" or "Shoot!" These are popular in group lessons or among juniors when everybody knows that people shouldn't be offending sensitive ears. Then there's the b) Out-and-Out Cuss Word. We all know what those are. George Carlin gave us the basic ones, and of course, there's a few more and some variations on the basic theme. Then there's the c) Ear-Melting Performance Art Vulgarity in its Purest Form. Sometimes these receive The Stunned Look in response (and onlooker reactions are beyond the purview of this little essay, so I won't go into any more detail). Option 3c usually comes from those who are either exceptionally creative or gifted with linguistic ability, those who like provoking unbelieving reactions for shock value, or those who are really, really angry. Of course, as I said, options 2 and 3 mix well together to reach just the right touch of blasphemy and/or heresy to make any party complete.

4) The Primal Scream. This is usually frustration in its reptilian form expressed through a preverbal, yet vocalized, utterance. I once heard one that was almost ten seconds long. The vast majority of utterances of this type consist of an "A" sound in some form (usually a long "A"), with maybe an implied or expressed consonant or two thrown in. But really, it can be almost any primalized vocalization. This is probably one of the best ones at making the player feel better immediately after, but also one of the ones that gets the funniest looks. This is distinguished from option 1 in that it is uttered out of frustration, whereas option 1 is just directed at improving response.

5) The Self-Deprecating Verbal Humiliation. This is inwardly directed; the player expresses his frustration with his or her self. This can be mixed with options 2 or 3 as well to make a tasty verbal salad. Usually, it comes out as "Come ON [, your name here]" (I add the brackets because adding your name is optional). Or as, "HIT that shot, [once again adding your name is optional]". Or "What is WRONG with you?" (addressing one's self, but as if out of body). Anything similar where a player speaks to the self with deprecation counts. Sometimes the player will just state his or her own name, and nothing else, in a contemptuous tone.

6) The Witty Repartee. This is really the only one that is unambigously intended for your opponent's ears. It consists of making some joke about something you did, such as "Must be a hole in my racquet." Yuk, yuk. It is sometimes lightly frosted with option 5, or, less frequently, one of the other options.

7) The Cosmopolitan. This is one of the other options, only uttered in a foreign language. There can be some dispute over whether this one is intended for your opponent's ears, unlike option 6, which is clearly meant as two-way communication. Perhaps you want your opponent to hear how sophisticated and erudite you are. Or maybe you just yell something not necessarily directed at any audience, and it happens to be in a foreign language. I'll leave that dispute to the sociologists. As an example of a Cosmo, I often find myself saying, "Ay!" (sorry that I can't figure out how to do the upside-down exclamation point at the beginning in a fashion that will show up on all computers on all platforms) when I miss a shot. It's only a true Cosmo if it's not your native language. For example, if you are playing somebody from Turkey, and he utters a Turkish cuss word, it's not a Cosmo, but rather, option 3. However, if I were to utter a Turkish cuss word, that would be a marvelous Cosmo, worthy of opera-style light applause and accolades. Bravo.

8) The Miscellaneous Interjection. Something that just doesn't quite rise to fit into option 3 (not even 3a), and doesn't quite lower itself to option 4. Usually it is a verbalization of very light frustration. It should be an actual word of interjection to qualify for this category, but I could see that a minority opinion would allow in some grunts that aren't words because they don't fall into any of the other categories. This would be something like "Oh!" or "Aw!" as long as it was expressed out of frustration.

9) The Violent Action. This is just option 4 in action form, and the only one that has no verbal component, although it can be combined with any of the verbal ones to increase the dramatic effect. Instead of verbalizing reptilian frustration, the player carries out an action that demonstrates to all onlookers that anger is definitely present. This can consist of throwing the racquet, punching the fence, angrily throwing a ball, etc. In it's most extreme form, the action is carried out against the opponent or a spectator. This is most likely to lead to bad consequences, such as being kicked out of the event, or even jail time.

I've seen expressions of elation as well as frustration; maybe I'll talk about those later.

Slippin' and-a Slidin', And Some Thoughts About Anger

Set 67-69 (of 365):

Stuart vs. J. at Patterson Park. Winner: J. 3-6, 7-6(1), 6-3.

My Mojo: Average, Frustrated by Sliding on Damp Courts, Tending Toward Blown Cool.

It rained last night. It didn't rain very hard, and it had stopped by the time I woke up around 6:30 in the morning, but the courts were wet. Just a little more than damp, really, but enough to really slide around on the courts, especially when I was trying to change direction quickly. By the time we got on the courts at 8:30 a.m., there hadn't been enough sun and there was too much moisture in the air to let the courts dry. The courts stayed damp through the whole match, but a few patches had gotten dry by the end of the match.

The first set was pretty straightforward on my part. Each of us won on our serves until we got to 2-2. Then I broke his serve, and won the next game on my serve, to make it 4-2. We each won our serves again, and the score was 5-3. Then I broke his serve one more time to win 6-3.

In the second set, he started hitting a lot more drop shots and angles. They were really getting to me, because I couldn't get enough momentum to get moving on the slippery surface. I was not able to get my feet started, and when I tried, I just slipped around like a cartoon character on a banana peel. One thing that was really weird about the second set was that every single regular game was a break. Neither one of us won any games on our serves. So we broke each others' serves every single game, and got to 6-6. I don't think I've ever played a whole set of breaks before. In the tiebreak for the second set, I just tensed up and couldn't get anything to work. He won the tiebreak 7-1 to win the set.

Now, I figure there are three things you can do with your anger when you are playing tennis. And just about everybody gets pissed off at some point when they are playing. You can:

1) Express it momentarily, either internally, or with a short verbal outburst, and then move on and let it dissipate. This is what I usually do.

2) Let it linger and eat at you. This hardly ever happens to me, but it has happened occasionally. But when I've seen it happen to other people (or to me), the person who does this hardly ever wins. It just corrodes their game.

3) The best thing you can do with your anger is turn it into steely determination, and dominate everything that happens fom then on. This is the hardest to do, and I am only able to convert it this way every once in a while, but when I do, it's golden.

I mention this because the last option is what I was able to do at the beginning of the third set. I could do no wrong, and everything I hit was pure gold. But it only lasted two games! I won the first two games really easily. Then I went back into uncertainty and confusion, and he won the next two games. I was hitting shots again that were letting him get back to his highly successful strategy of hitting lots of drop shots that I could not get to because I slipped on the court trying to get motion started, or pulled me wide so he could slam shots down the open end of the court, and again I could not recover because the court was too slippery to change directions quickly enough. I was trying to keep a wide stance to help my balance and push off my back foot, but I just could not get started quickly enough enyway, and my feet slipped around too much. He later told me that his strategy for dealing with the wet court was to keep his steps small and quick. Anyway, his strategy in the third set seemed to be working much better than mine was. Toward the end, I started telling myself that I needed to play more for placement than for power. This might have won me a game, but I was still down 5-3. For the last game, I told myself that I needed to eliminate my errors. And I did. I didn't lose a single point in the last game on one of my errors. He won it on his good placement of shots, and won the set 6-3.

An Unfinished Match, A Lesson, And Late Night Panic on my Bike

Sets 65-66 (of 365):

Stuart vs. T at Pharr. Winner: To Be Determined 6-2 (S), 4-6 (T), 2-2, to be finished Feb. 3 at Northwest Park.

My Mojo: Back And Forth

This was a ladder match. He showed up about fifteen minutes late, so I practiced hitting serves for a little while. After he showed up, we warmed up some, and I let him warm up some serves and told him I had already warmed up serves. The only problem was that the serves I had practiced had all been hard and flat, because I had wanted to work on that type of serve. I didn't practice any spin serves, but then I hit mostly spin serves in the games we played. So my serves were a bit off and I double-faulted a little more than usual. I think I had four or five double-faults in the match, which doesn't sound like much, but it's a little high for me. And two of the double-faults were in the first two games that I served. Also, at first my serves were not as accurate as they usually are. In those first couple games that I served, I had to do some fine-tuning, but after that, I got my serve where I needed it to be.

Despite the minor problems with my serve, I was playing pretty well at first. I won the first set without much struggle, though he did break my serve one game. That was made up by my breaking his serve most of the other games, except for one, and winning all the rest of the games I served. My serves in the first set were mostly pretty strong and gave me good offensive game, which I was able to capitalize on well to keep an advantage. And when he served, I was able to return most of his serves solidly, anticipating most of them well, even though some of them were pretty hard. His second serves were markedly less powerful than his first serves, so I was able to step in some to get more advantage, and that worked consistently. I saw him doing the same for my second serves, so I started serving my second serves almost as hard as my first serves, and I was able to get him on some second serves by putting power behing them that I don't think he expected. Also, if I was up by two or three points in a game, I served some second serves almost identical to my first serves. But I did mix it up some and served some second serves softer, just so he would not get complacent about what I was going to throw at him. I'm pretty good about mixing up my serves in general, though I do tend to rely on a lot of spin.

Then in the second set we had some scoring discrepancies that kind of blew my cool a little. But we had to go through and figure it out. I don't think it ever got back quite right, but we finally agreed on a score of 2-1, where I was ahead (after a LOT of discussion, and coming back to it several times). I don't think that score was quite right, though, because we had already had our second changeover of the set sometime before we had the scoring problem. Also, I was almost positive I had won at least three games, and that he had only won one. The games in the second set before the scoring discrepancy went by quickly (they were pretty lopsided and didn't have many long rallies), and it might have even been 4-1 in my favor. I'm not saying for sure that I was ahead by that much; I really didn't know for sure, and now, with the passage of more time, I'm even less certain. So agreeing to the score we agreed to was probably the right thing to do.

I really need to make an effort in the future to wrap my mind around the score and not get absent-minded about it. The whole discussion about the score really threw my rhythm off, and I never could quite get my pace back consistently. I don't know why the whole score discussion kind of dissolved my focus. I need to figure out a way to deal with that better. I don't think either of us was trying to cheat the other; we were both genuinely trying to figure it out.

My lack of focus weakened my play some, but a couple times I came back strong enough to win a game. He seemed to gain strength from the whole score melee and was playing really strongly. The games also changed in characted after the scoring discussion. They became hotly contested rather than one-sided, and the rallies got a lot longer and more challenging too. We got to 2-2 in the second set and then he won the next two games to get to 4-2. I'm not quite sure what the sequence was that got him up 5-3 (like I said, I was a little distracted and off focus), but I'm sure that the rest of the games were scored right after the scoring discrepancy. Then I won the next game to bring it to 5-4. I got squeaked out in the last game of the set, and lost the second set 6-4.

I didn't mind playing a third set, but I was positive we didn't have enough time left on the court to finish the set. I won the first two games easily, reverting to easily-won games with not much rallying, but then the next two became more challenging for me. He won the next two games. The first one he won easily and the second one was much more contested. My mojo was swinging back and forth. We saw people waiting for the court and we decided this was a good stopping point at 2-2.

I had to hurry up and pack my stuff and run to the other side of the facility to my:

Lesson with R. at Pharr (1 of 10):

My Mojo: Blind At First, Then Halfway Decent

I paid hurriedly for the next five lessons and ran over to court 7 to get to the lesson. I stepped right out onto the court and "Thud," the lights went out. Nobody could figure out how to get them back on. We only had one court tonight; usually we have two. So we had to go to the free courts across the street, which sucked, because the lights are pathetic. I couldn't see anything until the ball was right up on me, so I was missing all kinds of shots because I couldn't see the ball. This was frustrating me a great deal. Luckily, an hour into the lesson, we got a court back at Pharr, and I started hitting better. I wasn't really hitting anything outstanding, but I was doing OK. The lesson went a little long because of all the confusion so there was no time to stay after and hit with anyone.

I took off for home on my bicycle after the lesson, got about halfway there, and realized I had left my pack with my house keys, car keys and wallet on the court! AAACK! I turned around and sped back as fast as I could. When I got within sight of the courts, I saw the lights were still on. That meant that there was still someone there. And I saw that the lights were working on the court where the lights had gone out, so somebody must have figured out what was wrong. Thank God that they stayed after to try to figure out what was wrong with the lights. Otherwise, I would have been screwed. I pedaled as fast as my legs would take me, and when I got within about 500 yards of the court, the lights shut off. My heart was pounding. I got there just as everybody was coming out the door, and I pleaded to get my pack. Somebody had brought it in from the court, so it was in the office. They handed it to me, and I headed back home, much relieved. Now I'll take a hot bath and decompress.

Consistency City

Group Lesson With R. at Pharr (10 of 10):

My Mojo: Calm and Consistent

Not many people showed up tonight. There were only six people there, so we got to do a lot of moving around, which we do more of when there are only a few people. I was hitting the ball pretty consistently, and not really trying a lot for winner shots (though I did hit a few every once in a while). I felt pretty confident in most of the drills we did. I felt like since I've had a lot of practice lately with different opponents, it has helped me with the drills in the lessons. We played some games where we rotated two against one in singles drop feeding to seven points, and either I or the pair I was in won all of the games.

Afterwards, I stayed to hit with C. Usually the people who stay after to hit are some real sizzlers who like to hit the ball really hard and deep and play a little risky to try to get winners a lot, but C. doesn't hit like that. Tonight, I was trying to continue with my consistency theme. First I just was hitting all of the balls back consistently, tossing in just a few winners and drop shots for variety. Then I tried to return everything into the center of the court at the same spot deep close to the baseline. Then I tried to return everything to the deuce court corner. Then, toward the end, I was trying to alternate shots between the deuce and add court corners. And in the last five minutes or so, I just went back to hitting normally again, but I tried to throw in more winners. I was keeping at each of these themes fairly consistently no matter where in the court C. hit her shots to me. She got a few admirable shots against me too.

I wish that I had tried to arrange a match tonight before the lesson. I didn't try because the weather forecast for days had predicted rain for today and tonight, and I thought that it would be too wet to play. There was not a drop all day, though the clouds did move in, creating a contrast to yesterday's blue sky. I didn't even think the lesson would take place until I saw the evening forecast about an hour and a half before the lesson was due to start; it was the first time I hadn't seen rain in the forecast for tonight. Darn weather forecasters--the weather is all their fault. ;-)

Waiting for Godot

Sets 63-64 (of 365):

Stuart vs. S. at Northwest Park. Winner: Stuart 6-3, 6-1.
Ladder Match #5

My Mojo: Steady and Solid

Everybody must have been stir-crazy on this first day of beautiful weather after so many days of rain, sleet and ice. S. and I made plans to meet at 5:15 at Northwest Park, but I got there a little early, and there was a huge wait. All of the courts were taken, and there were about eight people waiting for empty courts. Luckily, four of them got scared away by the wait. And it was a long wait, too. We were supposed to be the third open court, but I thinksomebody snuck in on a court when we weren't looking. We ended up having to wait about an hour to be able to play, and we had to play on the worst court of the four there; it had some lights burned out and a little bit of water on it. I got out my towel and sopped up as much of the water as I could. It didn't completely dry it up, but at least it made it just surface water rather than a pool.

The first set was tougher than the second one. We went to a lot of games that were close and I just edged over. I was holding most of my serves but he did break me on one. It seemed like he was hitting a lot of shots long at first, and he tightened up on that a little. He also started out the set with two double faults, but corrected quickly. I was not making too many errors, and for almost all the ones I did make I could point to something clear that I had done wrong and corrected well throughout most of the match.

In the second set, he won the first game (he had won the first game in the first set too), but then didn't win another game after that. For the last three games, it seemed like he was just trying to get out of there and was not aiming as carefully and was playing quickly. However, he started trying some shots with a lot of power that worked occasionally but didn't work most of the time.

More Observations

Something really bad happened to my daughter last night. I don't really want to talk about it here, but playing tennis is helping me.

It is gorgeous outside and probably will be all day. Blue sky and sunshine is out there for the first time in couple of weeks. So, of course, I am trying to hustle up a match or two to play today. It is harder to get matches on short notice, but it is doable. I just have to email a lot of people and hope one of them can make time on the spur of the moment to play.

This has got me thinking about what it takes to try to reach a goal like I am trying to reach, that is, play a humongous amount of games over a protracted period of time. There will be some obstactles:

1. The weather. It does not always do what you want it to do. It may rain for days on end, it might destroy everything in sight with a tornado or a tsunami (though I would be a bit surprised to see a tsunami in Austin). You have to work around what Mother Nature gives ya, and for the last couple of weeks, Ma Na has not been good to tennis 'round here. Of course, there has been this drought thing in place that the rain is helping out a lot, so there's always an upside.

2. My limitations. I know that I'll have some injury or illness sideline me at some point. I've already run into just being worn out from pushing myself to play more and more,and kind of cycling into a low place.

3. Other people's limitations. Some people don't want to play as much, and some people have trouble working around their schedules. And, frankly, some people are probably getting sick of me constantly trying to fish up opponents. A couple of people have already told me to quit contacting them. I don't have a huge pool of people yet, so I have been having to go back to some of the same people over and over. Most don't mind, but some see it, I'm sure, as varying degrees of imposition.

Now, This Was Just Insane

Sets 60-62 (of 365):

Stuart vs. C. at Northwest Park. Winner: Stuart 6-1, 6-1, 6-2, 3-4 and 15-30.

My Mojo: Decent to Above-Average, Ending Up More and More Blind

Here I was thinking after the last match I played tonight that there was no way I was going to be able to play. The ground was pretty darn wet, and the air was so full of mist that my glasses just kept getting covered with droplets and fog. So I called C. about 45 minutes before the match. I didn't get him, but left a message expressing doubt that we'd be able to play. About ten minutes later, he called me back. I told him that it looked kinda borderline, maybe even on the wrong side of the border. He said he was on his way there and he would just check it out when he got there. Fair enough. I told him I'd head over there too, and we could decide when we got there.

When I got there, he was already there, playing against the backboard in the big wet. So I figured, what the hell, we'll play wetball. Tennis is a whole different thing when it's way wet outside. You never know what the ball is going to do. We hit for a while, and then started playing sets. Early on in the first set, I took a dive in a big patch of mud. I asked him if he wanted to move over to the next court, which at least didn't have huge amounts of mud there, and we moved over one.

The first two sets I was playing really well. I was holding my serve every time, and breaking his serve most of the time too. My placement was good, and my shots were doing pretty much what I wanted them to do. The match ended pretty quickly. We shook hands, but that was not the end.

I asked him if he wanted to hit some more or play another set. He said sure, he would play another set. So we played another set. Now, I was getting more and more blind as this thing went along. I don't know what was making it worse, but my glasses were just getting wet and foggy, and I just could not seem to shake it. Also, the balls must have weighed about three times what they normally weighed from all the water they had absorbed. Every time one of us put any spin on the ball, we could see the water just spinning off of the ball. We had opened a second can of balls and they had gotten soaked too. Despite all of these challenges, I won the third set easily.

So I asked him if he wanted to play some more, and we started a fourth set. This time, he not only played a lot tougher, but I also could not see a damn thing. There were too many shots that I just didn't know where the hell the ball was until it came down out of range. In the first four games, each of us won our serve, so the score was 2-2. Then he broke my serve, and he won the next game too. He was just hitting really well, and his placement was awesome. I didn't feel like my mojo diminished much, though I was starting to feel a little hungry, and the combination of his great play and my blindness was just whittling away at me. It was like I was suddenly playing a different player. So now I'm down 2-4. The next game was my serve, and I won it pretty easily to bring the score up to 3-4.

So he serves the next game and wins the first two points. He's up 30-0, and I win the next point, so it's 30-15. Right as he is serving the next serve, the lights go "Thud" and turn off. So we're suddenly in pitch black. We both laugh and I tell him that it looks like he's won this set. I look at my watch and it's 9:45. Why the hell would they turn the lights off at 9:45? Oh, well, I guess that's just what they do there. I'll file that away for future reference: the lights go off at 9:45 at Northwest Park. We leave the wet balls there. This was just insane. Not only did we play when I thought there was no way we would, but we play nearly four sets.

So he wins the last set, incomplete as it is, and he definitely earned it. I'm too anal to count it toward my goal though, because it wasn't finished. It didn't end with one of us winning at least six games like a normal set would, so Mr. Fussypants here won't let it count. That's why I'm only counting three sets toward the 365. This in no way diminishes his win of this last set; it counts in that way.

I Feel Victorious Just Because I Got To Play

Sets 58-59 (of 365):

Stuart vs. M. at Northwest Park. Winner: Stuart 6-2, 6-2.

My Mojo: Above-Average, Weakened to Average Briefly, Then Back to Above-Average

Dang, it has been a long time since the weather let up enough to play tennis. I haven't been able to play since the Wednesday before last, or nine days ago. The weather has simply not let up since then. It has either been raining, or flooding torrentially, or completely iced up since the 10th of January. That is the longest that anybody in my family has nott been able to play tennis in Austin in the whole time that my kids and I have been playing tennis in Austin, probably in the last eight or nine years.

I feel fortunate that a window of dryness opened up today. I sensed it happening at around noon today and I emailed a bunch of people to see if they wanted to try to play tennis tonight. I got two takers, and one of them was M., who agreed to meet me at 5:00 p.m. at Northwest Park.

M. had a really fast serve with a good amount of spin and a very compact motion. I admire people who have really good fast serves that come from not much motion. I think to myself how fantastic their serves would be if they used more motion, but maybe it doesn't work that way. I was serving really well and held all or most of the games that I served in both sets. So I had a feeling that if I broke any of his serves that I would win. My serves were not the usual mix of styles that I usually throw in. My first serves were almost all heavy spin serves that fell deep and close to either the middle or the sideline. On my second serves, I let up on the spin and power just enough to ensure accuracy, and I think I only double-faulted twice (enough to annoy me, but acceptable, especially since I was ahead in games). The serves that I hit seemed to give me a good physical advantage and a solid offense, and on the few points when I didn't have a physical advantage, after a while I felt like I had at least a psychological advantage.

In the first set, I was pretty far ahead. I got to 5-1, and then he won a game to make it 5-2, and then I won the next game to win the set. When he won that second game, I started feeling a little insecure about my play, and my mojo dipped a little. He was ahead in the next game and I thought he was going to win it to make it 5-3. But I came back at the last minute after he had gotten to game point and I won the set.

The second set was a little tougher starting out. He served the first game and won it easily. Then we each won the games we served in the next three games to make the score 2-2. Then I broke his serve in the fifth game and was up 3-2. I won all of the games after that. I was serving with a high amount of spin consistently throughout the match. In the last game, I was up 40-15, and decided to try a hard, flat serve with just about everything I could put into it. Pow! I slammed it down the center and won the match with an ace.

The second match ended just about in the nick of time. It had started misting toward the end of the second set. It was happening in about the last three games of the second set, but was getting steadily more intense. It didn't seem to be raining, or falling out of the sky; it was as if little droplets were forming in the atmosphere around us. It was really hard on me as my glasses were getting coated with not only the mist, but also fogging up, and it was hard for me to see in the last few games. I kept trying to wipe off my glasses almost every point, but my clothing was damp, and I couldn't find dry spots to wipe them off on. Also, I had left my towel outside of my tennis backpack, and it was damp too. The mist was getting thicker and thicker. So I wouldn't have been able to see much longer, and the courts got too wet to play about a minute after our match ended. It doesn't look like the next match that I scheduled for tonight will take place, as even if it stops misting, it looks too wet outside. The sun has gone down, so there's not much potential for the courts to dry, but it looked like the mist was not going to go away anyway. Maybe a miracle will happen; we'll see.

It's Still a Weather Thing

The weather is still nasty. Now it has been frozen for about two days, with sleet and ice storms. There is ice everywhere and it's still way fruzz. Most businesses have been closed for the last two days, including my workplace. Of course, Monday was MLK day, so a lot of those places would have been closed anyway. That worked out well.

I spent almost all day yesterday driving around. It didn't seem that bad to me. That's me, I hear people on the news saying "Nobody should go out under any circumstances," and I spend the whole day putzin' around outside. Sure, I slid around a little, but for the most part, I did OK. I even tried to go to work, but it was locked, and I couldn't get in. I went over to Manor (about fifteen miles outside of Austin) and picked up my duaghter.

At least the gym was open, that is, until last night. Every time I went there in the last few days, they were available. But last night, I went to two different gyms, and one was closed, and another was just closing. Then I got on 183, which is this highway that is mostly raised way above the ground, and it was solid ice. I drove really slowly. It was probably insane for anyone to be on it (I only saw two other vehicles on it the whole time I was on it and they were BIG truck-chassis thingys, maybe four-wheel-drive transpo, as opposed to my tiny car) and I am surprised that they let anyone on it at all. But when I wanted to get off, at least they had the exit blocked off for safety. Great. Here I am stuck on a deathtrap highway. Can't go too fast because I'll slide out of control and slip off the edge, and can't go too slow because I'll lost momentum and get stuck. And I did see a couple of abandoned cars on the way. I'm pretty sure that they did the "get stuck" thing. Oh, well, might as well make the most of it. So I went another four miles or so before I got off, and made it home. Ha, ha, beat death again.

Looked outside, and it is still frozen and icy. I think I'll ride my bicycle to work when it opens at noon. I definitely can't run to work because I'm sure I'll slip and fall on the ice somewhere on the way (probably about four miles or so). Nothin' like a little bike luge to get the day started.

Problematic Weather

The weather is posing a problem for me. It is definitely not conducive to tennis. I mean, I would go out and play right now on the ice, but I don't seem to be able to talk anybody else into it. Since Friday morning, it has been raining like crazy. I had a ladder match set up on Friday night, and we both went to the site, but it was way too wet. Dang it, I really wanted to play. He indicated he might not be able to play me this round, since he is only in town on weekends, and he has to schedule his other two matches around this weather that doesn't look like it will let up much for a while. Crap. I challenged him on the ladder, he is about ten rungs up from me, and I would like to move up to where I have competitive games. I mean, he might beat me, but if I beat him, I can move up faster than a snail's pace. It's not that I mind winning the games that I have played so far, but I want some challenge in my ladder games. At least I'm getting some opponents in my non-ladder games that are challenging me. Oh well, I guess I'll challenge somebody else the next ladder round.

On Saturday morning, it was hugely flooding. My electricity went out for about an hour and a half, so I decided to try to venture out in the nasty weather. I couldn't get farther than just a few blocks. Just a block away, the creek was flowing like a river over the street. It looked like it was about two feet deep, and raging brown water. I kept driving in several different directions after being forced to turn away from various and sundry weather emergencies, and finally made it to a convenience store (after driving through some rushing water that was a little deeper than I probably should have driven through in my little car), where I bought a newspaper, and trekked back home to sit in the dark. Well, at least it was daytime, so it wasn't that dark. I opened the blinds and let some light in and read the paper by the light coming in through the window. It was obvious I wasn't going anywhere else until the rain died down.

And now, this morning it froze over, so now the streets and sidewalks are sheets of ice. I haven't played tennis since last Wednesday, and now it's Monday. Dang, I wish I had set something up for Thursday. It was the last day before the rain. Not only that, but I forgot about the Thursday night group lessons at Pharr. I just spaced out completely. I didn't remember until it was almost 8:30, and by that time it was almost over. Bad juju. Boy, am I going to have to double up for a while once this clears up to get back on track.

So I've been spending a lot of time at the gym to make up for the exercise I am missing out on by not being able to play tennis. I've been lifting weights, getting aerobic stuff in, stretching, and doing various and sundry other exercise-related stuff. Yesterday I spent nearly an hour on the rowing machine. I love that machine because I gives you an aerobic workout that involves your whole body, not just your legs like most of the other aerobic stuff. And, it doesn't seem to be very popular, so I can get on it just about any time. Most people like the treadmills or the ellipticals. I gotta admit, I like the elliptical machines too, but the rowing machine kicks ass. I hate the treadmill. If you're gonna run, why not see scenery while you're doing it? I'll have to go on a nice run once the weather clears up. Also, this weekend I've had time to take long steambaths and saunas afterwards. Life is good, even if I can't play tennis right now.

The hell with it, why wait to run? I think I'll go for a run right now. Cold be damned. Let's see if I slip on the ice and bust my head open [maniacal cackle].

Little Milestones

I forgot to mention that today is my birthday. And yesterday, we had the final court hearing where I adopted my oldest daughter. She is not my biological daughter but has lived with me pretty much all of her life. Her sister is also my daughter, but biologically as well. Somebody at work made me lemon squares for my birthday (how nice!), but I had to take my oldest daughter to a doctor's appointment at lunch, and when I got back, they were all gone. Oh well, it's the thought that counts.

I didn't play tennis yesterday because I was so busy readying for the adoption hearing. I didn't know if it would go through. My daughter was in kind of a mood the day before, and had told the guardian appointed by the court that she didn't want to be adopted. Aaack. I was really stressed. I had to finesse emotions and reactions from her biological mom, from her, from the court people, and so on (as well as mine--at one point I felt like I was going to just completely fall apart). Luckily, she decided firmly on the court date that she did want to go through with the adoption, so it was finalized. Whew. I can't even express how much the stuff leading up to this stressed me out. I could hardly sleep the night before. When focus got off the adoption on anyone's part, I just told them I was only focusing on the adoption, and any other issues would be dealt with later. That seemed to work. And now I am so happy that I am the official dad of my darling little daughter. So for my birthday, I got to spend some time with my oldest little girl, and that is one of the best presents I could have gotten from anyone.

Squeezing in a Speed Set

Sets 55-57 (of 365):

E. vs. Stuart at South Austin. Winner: Stuart 6-4, 6-0, 6-1

My Mojo: Steady to Steadier

I was getting a bit annoyed for arriving late. I had given myself what I thought was more than enough time to get there, but the traffic on the freeway was really bad. We were stuck behind an accident and the road was barely creeping along. The ride on the freeway, probably only about six miles, took over half an hour. Luckily it started clearing up right before the exit I had to take and I was at the tennis center within five minutes of getting off the freeway.

E. was very gracious about my lateness and accepting of my apologies. I was only about eight minutes late, but I usually am early or right on time, so it was really out of character for me. The first set was the toughest one for me as my shots were a little bit jerky and stiff. I got trapped by a lot of angle shots and winners. His serve throughout the match was a really good mix of shots. I never knew exactly what was coming at me. I think he was really good at reading my stance too, because if I would ease back, it seemed like I got serves that were close to the net with a lot of spin, but if I would move in, then I would get really hard serves to the back of the box an the end that I was least prepared to return from. He won the first game of the first set, then I won the next two, then he won the next one, and we tracked each other pretty well until the end, when I broke out. And it wasn't just each of us holding serve either, it seemed like there was a good mix of winning by holding serve and by breaking the other's serve from each of us.

But in the second set, I loosened up a lot, and started moving more fluidly, both in my footwork and my strokes. This made me more accurate and made it easier for me to play offense. I won the second set a lot easier than I had the first and won all of the games, though some of them were close.

We only had twenty minutes left, and I asked him if he wanted to hit some more or play another set. Of course, I wanted to play another set so I could count it toward my goal. Luckily, he was hot to play another set too. I think we both knew we would have to have a pretty speedy pace if we were going to squeeze a set into twenty minutes. I was also trying to win as many points as possible so we could get done with the set and I could count it. We played at a pretty fast pace, serving second serves right after first serves, though it seemed like we got a higher percentage of first serves in. And we were both trying to cut off points rather than keep them going. I was still playing very fluidly, maybe even more so than in the second match. After five games, I was up 4-1. I called the ball out on one that I thought was barely outside the line on the point that would have made it 5-1 for me. He said if the set wasn't over (a mistake, it would have only been 5-1, not 6-1), he would challenge it. I said, what the heck, I'd give him the point. He put up a weak protest, but I insisted. I just wanted to play some more and bring it in closer to the timeline. So it was deuce instead of my game. We played a lot of points after that, and I squeaked out winning the game. The last game was very back-and-forth too, and went back and forth from deuce to ad a lot. The last three ads were mine, and I finally won match point. I looked at my watch and it was 6:59--we had the court until 7! We had barely squeaked in another set. Yee-haw!

Made It

Group Lesson with R. at Pharr (9 of 10):

My Mojo: Average

Didn't think I would make it here for most of the day, but I finally got a burst of energy late in the afternoon so I made it to the group lesson tonight. I was hitting OK for most of the night. Nothing special, but I was getting most of my shots in until we played Amarillo at the end of the lesson. Then I was hardly getting anything in until the very end of the drill. I started putting stuff away pretty well once I adjusted my shot to come in from underneath more. I even had enough energy to stay after the lesson and hit with some of the players from the class until we got kicked off the courts because the facility closed. But I don't have much juice left to make a long entry tonight. G'nite.

Now I've Recovered, So More On Yesterday's Matches

Wow. I really didn't realize how little wasabi I had left after playing yesterday. I could have done more throughout the ladder tournament. I neglected hydration, nutrition, and electrolyte replenishment, and that didn't help. I just didn't think about those things because it wasn't hot. I won't make that mistake again. I didn't drink enough water between matches, didn't eat enough, and should have been thinking about consuming sodium, potassium, magnesium, calcium, and carbs and sugars. I definitely learned my lesson. Like I said, at the end of yesterday's first match with L. I was cramping up. So I brought some apple cider vinegar to drink for my next match, and took a couple of swigs at the beginning of my second match. Blecch. But it really made the cramps go away almost instantly. I am swearing by vinegar for cramps; it really seems to work! Unfortunately, it didn't do much for my other symptoms. I had brought a powder mix of salt and potassium chloride (the active ingredient in prison executions by injection) to mix into my liquids, but I never did get to that, though I really should have. I also should have taken a magnesium/calcium supplement when I went home between rounds. I was badly fatigued by the time I started the second match, and getting an ear infection. Today my ear is a little better after having put hydrogen peroxide and alcohol in it last night.

More thoughts about yesterday's first match (third match in the ladder tournament): L. was a really tough player. She was the highest-ranked person on the ladder that I have yet beaten, though I don't think I have advanced to where I should be on the ladder up to this point. I was really on top of running her shots down, and, more importantly, reading her bodily movements to tell where she was going to hit the ball. This is the best that I think I have done at "pre-anticipation." I won one set, she won one, and then, as per the tournament director's instructions, we played a tiebreak in lieu of a third set. So I can't really count it as three sets, purist that I am.

More thoughts about yesterday's second match (fourth match in the ladder tournament): I was doomed from the start. I didn't have the physical thing going due to my extreme depletion, and the mental part crumbled by the end of the first set. I started out weak but very, very relaxed. At the beginning of the match, I was just thinking that I don't care how anything comes out. Win a point, I don't care. Lose a point, I could care less. I kept this attitude up through playing the match to about 4-4. Then, suddenly, my mood swung and I started caring. Maybe this was a downfall point in the first set. I did get to 5-5, and then I couldn't do anything right in the next two games, and lost 7-5.

In the second set, I won the first two games. This was an absolute miracle, because I was physically barely able to stand. At this point, I noticed for the first time that he was a lefty. This information was only used for evil, though, as I only won one more game for the rest of this match. The bottom fell out of my game. Nothing went back right, I couldn't get to many of his shots, I was totally playing defense and hardly any offense at all, and I started getting really mad at myself. I usually am really even-tempered, but my physical depletion made me really short-tempered and I was cursing myself under my breath. At the end of the match, I had to go sit on the bench for about ten minutes before I could even get up again. I dragged myself home, ate a prodigious amount of food, and forced myself to type a few words before I took a bath. I coudn't even stay in the bath longer than about five minutes. I went to bed before nine o'clock, totally exhausted, and feeling nauseous.

This morning I felt much better, but I still can use some recovery. Luckily, I don't have a match scheduled for tonight. Maybe I'll go to the Monday group lessons at Pharr, maybe I won't. It depends on how I feel by tonight.

Two More Matches in One Day

Sets 51-52 (of 365):

Stuart vs. L. at Caswell. Winner: Stuart 7-6(4), 4-6, 1-0(10-8)

My Mojo: Solid Gold (In Like Flint), But Gas Tank on Empty at the End

The weather was back to being pretty decent for this third match of the ladder tournament. Frankly, I hadn't expected to get to a third match, so this one was bonus. Woo-hoo, bonus. This was one tough match. But I was ready to play a tough match. My patience was just about perfect, my shots were rolling the right numbers on the dice, and I was getting to just about everything. Of course, i just squeaked it out. My opponent was really good. She was not a hugely hard hitter, but was good on placement. I didn't know how much this match would take out of me, though. By the end of the match, I was really depleted. I was out of fuel, my mojo was wounded, and I had used up everything I had to win this match. My body was also crying out in pain and exhaustion. I begged for some time before the next match, and the tournament director gave me an hour.

Sets 53-54 (of 365):

Stuart vs. C. at Caswell. Winner: C. 7-5, 6-3

My Mojo: Low Energy, Leaked Out Like a Flat Tire.

I never was able to fully recover from the last match. I tried just about everything. I went home and iced down painful areas. I tried eating something substantial to give me some fuel. I was also starting to get an ear infection, and my left ear was starting to hurt more and more. I was cramping up big time right before the match. I never did fully recover by the time the match started, and my mojo leaked out to near nothing. By the end of the match, I was pissed at myself, and a half an hour later, I was ready for death to come take me. I should be so lucky. Anyway, I'm still exhausted, so I'm headed for a long warm bath, and more about this match later. Uggghhh...

Two Matches, Two Days, Two Opponents, Different Results

1/5/06:

Sets 47-48 (of 365):

Stuart vs. S. at Caswell. Winner: S. 6-1, 6-2.

My Mojo: Sluggish

This was the first round of the ladder tournament. The weather was just gorgeous. It was in the 70s with hardly any wind at all. The skies were sompletely clear. I went into the match thinking that I was playing well, and I felt like I was in sync in the warmup, but once I got into the match, I was just about a quarter-second behind from where I usually was on just about everything. My anticipation was really sluggish and I felt like I was playing in a fog. It was like swimming in maple syrup. I just was not getting to shots that I thought I should have gotten to, and I didn't get set up in time to hit really solid shots back.

Also, my "edge shots" were just not making it over the edge. Most of the time when I hit toward the lines, the ball went out. Or when I tried for barely above the net, it went into the ribbon. When I tried for drop shots, they fell short. Aarrgh. Those "edge shots" can make a match if they are good, or break a match if they are bad. They didn't seem to be the deciding factor in this one, though, as it was mostly my slowness that was killing me and making me commit too many unforced errors or return the ball weakly so my opponent could smash it to a weak spot. My opponent played very well and won the match, though we did have a lot of games that went back and forth from deuce to add. So I didn't feel like it was a complete rout even though the score was lopsided. I have to say, though, that he did definitely outplay me.

1/6/06:

Sets 49-50 (of 365)

Stuart vs. D at Caswell. Winner: Stuart 6-1, 7-5

My Mojo: Above-Average

What a difference a day makes. Going into the second round of the ladder tournament, the weather was completely different. It was cold and wet, with intermittent rain and some delays during the day, but nothing too long. I spent some time squeegeeing courts so we could get back out, as did other players. It was really hard for the courts to dry with the wet, cold, humid weather, so everybody started up on damp courts. The pitter-patter of tennis feet helps dry out the courts some; I think by the end of my match the courts were pretty much dry even though the sun had gone down.

And my play was completely different, too, though I went into the match pretty pessimistic. I don't know why, but I felt pretty fatalistic going into this match and thought I was going to lose. After we warmed up and I won the first game (and I saw that I was playing much better than last night), I lost the dark cloud over my head pretty fast.

My opponent tonight seemed very similar in style and ability to the guy I played last night. The difference was that tonight, I was there for the shots. Also, this guy double-faulted a little more. He had a really hard first and second serve, but his serve was a little more erratic than most; at least for most people that I've played. I don't know if the high number of double faults was a constant for him or if he was somewhat off on his serve tonight. But I was handling his serve well. He did seem to get it in more in the second set, though he still double-faulted more than seemed normal. My split-steps were well-timed and were getting me to most of his really fast serves that went in, though he did get me on a few of them. My anticipation was really good and I was getting to where I needed to be on the court.

I was really not in a third-set mood tonight, though. If it had gone to a third set, I might have lost. Usually, I am up for playing just about forever, and look forward to five-hour marathons if necessary. Third sets are usually dessert for me. But I didn't feel up to that tonight, though I thought I could possibly pull out what I needed to to win the second set. I was up 5-2 in the second set, and then he won the next three games to even it out at 5-5. That was bugging me some, as I did really, really did not want to lose the second set and have to get to a third set. Maybe if I would have had to play a third set, I could have re-centered myself after taking a break, and mentally adjusted myself to what I needed to do. And I definitely would have taken a break after the second set if we split rather than jumping right into a third set.

But the next game after the 5-5 tie was my serve, and I decided to just watch the ball on the serve, try to get it back every time, play with as much strategy in mind as early as possible, and just take it point by point, without regard for where we were in the set or the match.

I also took breaks on the last two changeovers, though I had played the entire first set and part of the second without breaking on the changeovers; I just went straight to the other side to play, and so did my opponent, for the most part. But on these last two breaks that I took, I ritualistically took a drink, wiped sweat with a towel, wiped my glasses, and did a little breathing for relaxation, probably keeping within the ninety seconds allowed. What I was doing seemed to work for me well, and I won the next two games. The first one (the one I served) I won four points in a row, and the next one was a little closer, but I won the last two points of the game that won the match fairly easily. Woo-hoo! I made it to a third round in the tournament, and didn't get poured out without winning a match!

It was kinda strange that on each of these days in each of these matches, my mojo flowed the opposite of the weather. Good weather, mojo in the toilet. Bad weather, killer hot mojo. Just an observation.

My Ho-Hum Game

Sets 45-46 (of 365):

Stuart vs. R. at Pharr. Winner: Stuart 6-3, 6-4.

My Mojo: Fair to Middlin'

During this match I had a hard time figuring out how to play. I mostly held my serve, except for one game in the second set. I did surge at the end of both sets. In the first set, we were even up until 3-3, then after I broke his serve for the first time, I got the advantage. The second set was more of the same story. In the second set he served first so he was up a game up until 3-2. Then I broke his serve, and he broke my serve, and after it got to 5-3, he won the next game to make it 5-4, and then I won the last game. His serve was not terribly hard but was very solid. I double-faulted more than usual and lacked as much confidence in my serve as I usually have. My game was pretty ho-hum, but I did squeeze enough out to edge it over.

Afterwards I had another group lesson with R. at Pharr (8 of 10).

My Mojo: Up, Down, Then Back Up

I started out really great, and was hitting shots fantastically for about the first half hour, winning the majority of the points in the drills we were playing against just about everyone in the class, but then the bottom dropped out for a while, and I couldn't hit too well. Then, toward the end, I started hitting well again. How odd. I didn't stay after to hit with class members like I usually do, mainly because I had some matters to take care of at home.

Overpowered

1/2/07:

Sets 43-44 (of 365):

Stuart vs. J. at Shipe Park. Winner: J 6-1, 6-1

My Mojo: Below-average to Average

This was my second match of the day. This time, at least, I had plenty of time to eat and rest a little between the first and second matches. So for the first two days of the New Year, I've played five matches in two days. Not bad. I haven't played any matches that went three sets in a while, except when I can talk my opponent into playing a third set. One of these days, I'll play someone that I can talk into playing about seven sets or something like that.

Anyway, back to this match. I had a hard time getting a handle on his spin, which was either really fast topspin or backspin. I was not reading the spin well and so I was hitting shots off. I could not get an offense going most of the time and played defense too much. I also had a few lobs that fell short that he was able to take advantage of, though he hit one or two into the net. I did have a decent serve going for me today and it was the best part of my game. The bottom line was that he just overpowered me. I could have done a better job of anticipating; I noticed that I was not setting up early enough for my shots and that wasn't helping me with my aim. When i would notice this, I would start setting up better and it would help, but I kept drifting back to late setup. I just could not get a winning plan going and just consistently got munched.

Ridin' That Train Like Bamboo Under Fingernails

Sets 41-42 (of 365):

Stuart vs. L. at The Quarries. Winner: Stuart 3-6, 6-5, retired

My Mojo: Swung Wildly From Low to High

I hate to win by forfeit. Especially when we were playing such a good match. This guy was major tenacious. I could not seem to get anything by him. He ran down everything and hit back stuff that I thought he would never get to. He was obviously very well-conditioned. His shots were not super-spectacular, but they were solid, and he sure bounced just about everything back. At first, I could not seem to get any kind of mojo going at all. My play was not too bad, but I just could not get a foothold in. I lost the first set by just being ground down.

The second set started out much the same way, only worse. Before I knew it, I was down 5-0. I really thought it was curtains. But my mojo was coming up slowly. I was hitting spectacular stuff, but he was coming back with miraculous moves!

My Hail Mary play was visualizing a train going down the tracks. I won the next game, and the train started going faster and stronger. Then I won another, and another. My spectacular stuff was starting to work more and more. The train was really chugging down those tracks; I was starting to feel like nothing was going to stop it. My mojo was growing like bamboo under fingernails.

I also started thinking about patience. When I lost some points, it was because I had not been patient enough; I had been trying to force something too early. I knew I couldn't afford to not be patient. I also started thinking about the doubles player I played yesterday, and how he got me with so many angles. So I started playing more angles when the right moment arose (patience!), and most of them worked, though a couple did go long or into the net. I did get a high percentage of them to work for me. Now the train was starting to zig-zag.

Next thing I knew, I was up 6-5. I had won six games in a row from 5-0! I was pretty darned sure I was going to win the next game, and I was roarin' to play a third set. But my opponent said that he had to forfeit. He said his tennis elbow was bothering him too much. I've never gotten tennis elbow (knock on wood, throw salt over my shoulder, kiss a shrunken head, whatever...), luckily, but it seems to be a real scourge for some players.

Today's Trifecta

Today, for the first time, I scheduled three matches in one day. Woo-hoo, a trifecta! I am still waiting to hear from somebody who may want to play a fourth match with with me today. I wonder what it would be like to play for twenty-four hours straight? I'd probably have to arrange getting a ton of fluids and food there. Maybe I'll give that a shot sometime.

But today, so far, I've only played for a little less than six hours. That would be a tad short of one-fourth of a full twenty-four hour marathon. Yeah, I could play another match. Banzai.

Sets 35-36 (of 365):

D. vs. Stuart at Connally High. Winner: Stuart 6-3, 6-2

My Mojo: Average to Above-Average

It was a cold morning, about thirty-five degrees. I underdressed, though I did wear long sleeves and long pants, thinking that once I got moving I would warm up. That is pretty much what happened, but my teeth were chattering once we got started. My opponent was wearing three layers.

We started playing at eight in the morning (Is it insane to get up to play that early on New Year's Day? I was up until about one in the morning the night before). The wind started out slow and picked up throughout the match.

I was having a hard time at first. He started out winning the first three games. Then I figured out that his serve was not very hard, but had a lot of spin, so I started positioning myself a little closer in to receive serve. That helped a lot. I was also strategizing well and hitting shots frequently to where he could not get them. He did that to me a lot less, though he did get a few good angles in. He put some pressure on but I just played consistently to win the match. A good deal of the shots that he was able to get me on were shots that were drop shots or close to the net when I was expecting baseline shots.

Sets 37-38 (of 365):

S. vs. Stuart at Northwest Park. Winner: Stuart 6-1, 6-1.

My Mojo: Above-Average to Excellent

I had to really hurry to get to the next site and didn't have time to rest in between. I got there barely in time but was about a minute late because I really had to go to the bathroom once I got there. It was a little warmer by this time, but I still kept my long sleeves on. I played solidly and made very few errors. This guy was one of the highest ranked guys on the ladder that I have beaten, and the margin was pretty decisive. Maybe he was having a bad day and some other time he would do much better. I don't know. He did seem to make a lot of errors. My serves were going right where I wanted them and the games I served I was able to stay on the offense with a lot of power in my strokes. Most of my serves in this match had a lot of spin and some got a bit curvy due to the spin. He seemed to have a hard time finding a footing.

Sets 39-40 (of 365):

Stuart vs. T. at Private Courts. Winner: T. 6-1, 7-5

My Mojo: Average to Above-Average

It had really warmed up and I was able to take off my long-sleeved shirt to play in the T-shirt I was wearing underneath. It was probably around 60 by this time, and the wind had died down to less than ten miles per hour. This time I had plenty of time to get to this site as the last match only lasted about forty-five minutes. So I had time to eat also, but had a hadr time finding a place open on New Year's Day. I finally picked up a falafel pita sandwich at Sun Harvest (mmm...falafel) to fuel me up for the next match. And I needed fuel, too, since I had no time to eat anything after the first match.

T. was the best opponent I played all day. He had really solid shots, and a knack for hitting the ball to spots on the court that I was out of position to get to. He retained really good power on the games that he served, and in the first set, edged me out on the games I served. He was excellent at hitting angle shots and got me on a lot of those. He said he played a lot of doubles. Usually when somebody tells you they play doubles, they are using it as an excuse for some perceived weakness at singles. But this guy played really strongly though he did play with a lot of doubles strategy. I got totally wiped out in the first set.

In the second set, I played a lot more solidly; at least on the games I served. He still was able to blow me away on the games he served, but I held serve at first, and was up 5-4, with each of us having won our service games. My serves were really solid and were often winners. I was also throwing in a good mix of spin serves, hard flat serves, deep serves, and serves that pulled wide or to the middle. I was not just tossing over the same serve every time. He won the next game on his serve to even up at 5-5, and then he broke my serve the next game. At that point I pretty much knew it was over. He was just too solid when he was serving, and I could not come up with a plan to break through. He ended up winning the second set 7-5 to win the match.